San Francisco's chief information officer, Jon Walton, told CNET that the change is due to an established policy requires the city purchase only EPEAT-certified desktops, laptops, and monitors. While there is a wavier process for special equipment -- like a police computer that requires a particular technology -- it is lengthy and many departments don't take on the wait, he said.

The EPEAT registry was created by government agencies, activist groups, and manufacturers, including Apple, and requires electronics be easy to recycle and have higher energy efficiency.

Officials hope Apple will reconsider taking its products off the list, but EPEAT CEO Robert Frisbee told the Journal that Apple's latest laptop, the MacBook Pro with its high-resolution Retina screen, would not have been eligible for certification because the computer's battery is glued into its case, which makes recycling the toxic parts difficult.

According to stats from the Journal, this won't be much of a blow to Apple. Only about 500 to 700, or 1 percent to 2 percent total, of San Francisco computers are Macs. Walton couldn't confirm the numbers, but said the city is hopeful Apple will reconsider the certification or present the city with their own standards to keep San Francisco environmentally friendly.

"I'm hopeful since we haven't had a dialogue with Apple on this, and we're not really clear why they chose to do this, that they may have other standards," he said, adding that the city's environmental department has reached out to Apple, but he's not sure if they have connected on the issue.

We've contacted Apple for more details and we will update as we get more information.